The Conejo Valley Unified School District board voted Tuesday night to reject the proposed Bridges Charter School, saying the petition has holes.
Superintendent Mario Contini said district staff had various concerns with the petition, including inadequacies with the budget plan and a proposed home-school program. The staff said the petition also failed to clearly address the needs of special education students and English-language learners.
The board voted 4-1 to reject the charter. Trustee Mike Dunn was the lone supporter.
“I am impressed by your passion your drive,” Dunn said to charter petitioners. “All progress comes from innovation and I’m sympathetic to you.”
Teachers and parents at the Open Classroom at Conejo School said they decided to propose the Bridges Charter School because they want to expand the program and gain more autonomy to develop it.
Parents and teachers said they want to locate the K-8 charter at University School, which closed at the end of last school year. They hope to open Bridges by fall 2010.
The Open Classroom is one of two magnet programs in the district. Its teachers focus on cognitive, social and emotional learning while providing hands-on experience and projects for students. About 140 students are in the K-6 program. Conejo School also has traditional K-5 classes that serve about 390 students.
Charter supporters said the district did not give them enough time to fully respond to the concerns, forcing them to appeal to the Ventura County Board of Education to meet state deadlines.
“Staff had the charter proposal for six weeks before asking a single question, and without spirit of collaboration, delayed until two working days before the vote tonight and before they gave Bridges a take-it-or-leave-it proposal,” Bridges board President Randy Witt told trustees Tuesday. “For Bridges to meet deadlines with the county and state, there is no time for extensions.”
Contini held up two Memorandums of Understanding during the meeting. If charter petitioners would have signed the MOUs, which address the district’s concerns about the charter’s general operation, budget and special education plans, the board could have supported the program, Contini said.
Charter petitioners, however, said they would not sign the MOUs. Teacher and lead charter petitioner Lori Peters said they responded to many of the district’s concerns and agreed to some of the district’s requests, such as dropping the home-school component of the charter.
She said some components the district wanted would contradict the Open Classroom’s vision of a “collaborative team effort.”
“We really wanted to work with the CVUSD administration and we managed to answer most of their questions,” Peters said. “We believe we have a very sound charter. We believe in the process of collaboration. They asked us questions that we could not meaningfully answer until we have the staff, teachers, the site and students.”
But Trustee Pat Phelps said charter petitioners placed the board in a difficult position. “They are asking us to take a leap of faith, but they will not sign the MOUs,” Phelps said. “That’s a bad sign of good faith down the road. It shows they are not interested in working with the district.”
Witt said they plan to file an appeal with the Ventura County Office of Education by Monday.
Contini said if the Office of Education approves the charter, the district would provide three possible sites for the new school but probably not the University School campus. The district plans to open an early childhood center there.
Printer-friendly version
Send to friend
PDF version